Just as snow returned to La Plata County and the Winter Olympics entered its final days, the Durango High School Alpine skiers competed against the best in Colorado on Thursday and Friday at Colorado High School Activities Association's (CHSAA) Alpine Skiing State Championships at Golden Peak in Vail.
The Durango girls led the way, finishing sixth out of 13 schools with 250 points. Summit won the team title with 347 points, with Battle Mountain in second with 316 and Aspen in third with 313. The Durango boys finished eighth out of 13 teams with 252 points. Summit was first with 319, followed by Steamboat Springs in second with 315 and Middle Park in third with 309.
“Overall, we did fairly well,” Durango Alpine skiing coach Jill Carithers said. “The girls competition is really tough. That sophomore group of girls coming in, including ours, is very competitive. You can see that with the state winners … We took nine total athletes to state, so most of them qualified in both slalom and giant slalom. We had a couple of single qualifiers, but that worked out great as well.”
State started out with the giant slalom competition on Wednesday. Senior Corbin Horrocks led the Demons with a 17th-place finish on the boys side, with the final time of one minute and 47.51 seconds. The final time for each skier was the combined time of their two runs. Horrocks’ first time was 50.09 seconds, and his second time was 57.42 seconds. Summit’s Seth Montgomery took the title in 1:36.63.
Carithers complimented Horrocks for how steady he is, and she said he did well despite not having his best runs. Carithers highlighted the competition level the Demons faced, with many of the top skiers competing around the world, compared to Durango’s skiers struggling with snow levels in a warm winter.
Junior Johan Souders finished 29th in 1:50.86, and sophomore Brody Tomberlin finished 34th in 1:52.23 to round of the top three Durango boys in giant slalom.
The Durango girls were led by freshman Jocelyn Mehaffie’s 32nd-place finish in 1:54.40 in the girls giant slalom on Thursday. Right behind her was Durango sophomore Isabelle Ratcliff in 33rd in 1:54.49. Durango senior Brianna Tomberlin finished 38th in 1:57.64. Summit’s Malie Dieterich won the race in 1:37.97.
“Gold Peak was great … we had about two inches on Wednesday, and another three to four on Thursday,” Carithers said. “But underneath, after you get that many racers through an inspection, it gets down to that real hard race surface for the most part … Gold Peak is a training center for ski racing, so it's the perfect groom.”
The skiers competed in slalom on Friday, with Horrocks having the best result in Durango in 10th in 1:21:48. Souders finished 17th in 1:25.40, and junior Nathan Mehaffie finished 25th in 1:30.76. Summit’s Montgomery won in 1:10.11.
On the girls’ side, Tomberlin led the Demons in 23rd in slalom in 1:32.41. Ratcliff finished 27th in 1:34.52, and Mehaffie finished 36th in 1:38.52. Battle Mountain’s Eden DeMino won in 1:17.76.
bkelly@durangoherald.com
